In Revelation 7:4-8, John hears the number of those sealed: 144,000 from the tribes of Israel (with Dan notably missing, but Manasseh rounding out the twelve). The same(?) 144,000 also appear with the Lamb on Mount Zion in 14:1-5, where they are described as firstfruits. Who are these 144,000 people who are sealed? I've considered a couple options:

Being "firstfruits" they represent a group of special Christians who have kept themselves especially righteous.

Being from Israel, they represent the number of Israelites according to the flesh who are also Israelites according to God's Spirit.

Owing in parallel to a hearing/seeing theme with 5:5-6, the 144,000 from Israel in 7:4-8 might be the same as the uncountable multitude from every tribe in 7:9.

I'm not fully convinced by any of these, though. I realize Revelation is a difficult book to interpret, but I'm looking for any thoughts that might help.

6 Answers
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First we must lay out two basic interpretive principles. Then I will list the meaning of the 144,000 (Revelation 7:4-8; 14:1-5) for each of the four main Christian interpretive approaches to the book of Revelation.

Interpretive Principles

First we must decide if the 144,000 mentioned in Revelation 7:4-8 are the same as those in 14:1-5, or if they refer to separate groups. Early Christians such as Origen understood these to be the same, but some dispensational theologians do not believe that this is the case.

We then have essentially two interpretive choices remaining: to interpret the number symbolically or literally. Assuming both Revelation 7 and 14 refer to the same group, they are either literally 12,000 Jewish male virgins from each tribe or they are symbolically the people of God. There are good arguments on both sides of the fence, but we must be consistent with the approach chosen. For instance, a literalist who believes both Revelation 7 and 14 refer to the same people should not take the number 144,000 literally without also taking the ethnicity, gender, and celibacy of these individuals literally as well.

Four Main Perspectives

All of these approaches are inherently symbolic except for the futurist approach, which is literal (although some futurists also believe the number to be symbolic).

Historicists associate the 144,000 with the Church. They believe the number is symbolic and indicates the totality of the Church.

Preterists believe that 144,000 is a symbolic number of Jewish Christians who escaped the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.

Futurists claim that the 144,000 are either a remnant of the Jewish people (literal) or the last generation of Christians alive during the Tribulation (symbolic).

Idealists consider the 144,000 to be a symbolic number representing all God's people throughout all history under the old and new covenants (i.e. spiritual Israel).

Sources

Origen, "Origen’s Commentary on the Gospel of John", trans. Allan Menzies In, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume IX: The Gospel of Peter, the Diatessaron of Tatian, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Visio Pauli, the Apocalypses of the Virgil and Sedrach, the Testament of Abraham, the Acts of Xanthippe and Polyxena, the Narrative of Zosimus, the Apology of Aristides, the Epistles of Clement (Complete Text), Origen’s Commentary on John, Books I-X, and Commentary on Matthew, Books I, II, and X-XIV, ed. Allan Menzies (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1897), 297-98. The relevant sections referenced in this answer can be read for free online here and here.

Nicely done and thanks for all the sources! It's nice to have a summary of the various viewpoints. Since I tend toward Preterism, it's easy to look up what other Preterists believe. Or, since I tend to see the 144,000 as representing God's people in general, I can see which framework(s) agree with that. This is a model answer.
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Jon Ericson♦Jan 9 '13 at 19:45

I take the 144,000 to be certainly a symbolic number. A perfect amount of 12,000 people from anything, and that twelves times over, can't under any rational system be literally 144,000 people regardless of the prophetic situation, current, past or future.

The question then is what does it mean as a symbol surrounding the Lord? Naturally the twelve tribes represent the church of God, with respect to the people of Israel and 1000 indicates a full large extension of the meaning it multiplies. Therefore there are only two competing interpretations in my own mind, one which I prefer.

The first possibility, is that they represent the entire invisible church, from the beginning of days until the end (or if one interprets this vision not to encompass all of time, then the church during that time one envisions). Under this possibility, the great multitude are the same, but as seen by John in its more literal sense following right after.

The second possibility is that they represent the Jewish part of all the believers in Messiah and the great multitude represent is the rest of the elect, so that both images combined represent the entire church under all ages (or whatever age one thinks this prophecy speaks of).

My personal view is that the 144,000 represent Jewish believers only, From Abraham until the final judgment. I believe this distinction is made not that the Jewish believer is superior to the Gentile, but because:

...the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. (Romans 1:16, NIV)

I guess that falls in line with your middle bullet. As I understand it all of these believers, Jew and Gentile were sealed from eternity in their election and represented by a definite number for an indefinite. Therefore, I see no difficulty clamping down on this interpretation with a certain amount of confidence. If I took a narrower scope of this vision, for example, only during the destruction of Jerusalem, or only at some future time near the end of the world, I would still hold the same position from the symbolism employed.

An interesting question. I have also asked my RE teacher about this last year. This answer combines what he said, what the comments in my edition of the Bible say and some personal opinion.

From the comments in the Universal Translation of the Bible to German:

(ad 7:4-17) There are twelve tribes of Israel, thousand is the number of multitude.
The number 144,000 is twelve times twelve times thousand and symbolizes all the people
who will be saved. The "sealing" means God knows their number in advance. In verse 9,
the saved people are explicitly called an uncountable group of people
(compare Daniel 12:1, Mark 13:10).

So, the 144,000 are not to be taken literal, but mean that many people from the twelve tribes of Israel will be saved. The "uncountable multitude" (I have translated it more literally in the citation of the comment) means that not only Jews, but righteous people from any "tribe" will be saved.

The commented Bible edition quoted here is the one handed out in Austrian schools and was created by the Roman Catholic and the Protestant chruches.

The 12 tribes usually refer to tribes with Land and Levi is left out, here we see Levi included and Dan left out, Joseph and Ephraim are synonymous.

Two of the tribes; Judah and Benjamin (and some Levites) have always been identifiable and today are know as the Jews. The other 10 tribes; the house of Israel, were scattered,(Isaiah 28:25) divorced by Yah (God) (Jeremiah 3:8) and became unidentifiable, lost (Hosea 1:10). Yeshua (Jesus) said; "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Matthew 15:24), meaning not the Jews but the other 10 tribes, who at the time of Messiah were scattered in the nations. So after Yeshua sent his disciples into the nations (Acts 1:8), the non-Jewish Israelite that received Messiah (Acts 2:39), who today are called Christians, are the other 10 tribes.

Isaiah 28:25 'Thus says the Lord God, "When I gather the house of Israel from the peoples among whom they are scattered, and shall manifest My holiness in them in the sight of the nations, then they will live in their land which I gave to My servant Jacob.

I know this sounds reaching but it's scripturally sound. It's a confirmed FACT.

So the 144000 are The Jews (2 tribes) and the Christians (10 tribes) ie. the two houses of Israel. (1Kings 12:21, Isaiah 46:3, Jeremiah 2:4, 3:18, 11:10,17)

Now the Question is; What is their job?

This is my theory, (as crazy as it seems), it make sense scripturally.

I believe the two houses (the 144000) are the two witnesses moving in the spirit of Elijah, preaching the new revelation of the latter ran, the knowledge of the little book, that Daniel said would increase and wll make war with the anti-christ, taking Edom, Moab and Ammon which will be the hiding place for the remnant, and they, (the two houses, two witnesses, the 144000) will lie dead in the street and be resurrected into heaven to be with Yeshua on Mt Zion. Oh yes, and they all can sing (the new song).

Here's a way out theory. Would love to hear your feedback. According to the bible Heaven is a place where the streets are paved with gold with 12 gates of pearl. According to Sumerian texts the Annunaki are based on planet X and enters our orbit every 26000. The Annunaki were in search of gold for their planet (or heaven). They 'discovered' the gold deposits on earth namely Africa and decided to 'come down' and mine the gold. They were not prepared to do the physical work and 'created' servants 'in their image' to do the work. They had to leave at a point when their craft 'had' to return to the planet or it would have been 'too late' to get back to it from earth. Jesus, an invitrofertilization experiment/intervention to 'control' or manage the created humans promised to return and take the humans to a place where he comes from. The craft that they use can only seat 144 000 so no more no less and only from the 'initial' race they created, no one else! Far-fetched but possible!..Would also explain the distinct differences between God the Father (Yaweh) of the old testament and the forgiving nature of God the Son (Jesus) of the new testament. "I am going to prepare a place for you and when I come back I will receive you unto myself that where I am there ye may be also". The star of David that led the wise men to his birth 'moved'. Stars are fixed.It is impossible for a star to descend so low as to point over a 'single' and distinct 'house'. The closest star we have is the sun. Any closer and the earth would be incinerated. A space craft can 'move' and 'lead' people and can also hover and 'point' to a single house. Cloud (smoke) by day and fire (burning engine fuel) by night also suggest a space craft leading the Israelites out of Egypt. Food for thought since there are so many interpretations and disagreements amongst christians and christian scholars themselves. Await feedback or any refutation of claims made above.

Sounds like complete nonsense to me. What is the Sumerian text you claim talks about planet X?
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curiousdanniiNov 7 '14 at 10:42

Sumerian tablets of stone...similar to the tablets Noah received on Mount Sinai...and actually those ones were carved with the finger of god....sounds like being carved with laser beams...high tech from alien technology ..so not so much nonsense really...just need to get our heads around fantasy (the bible) and (posssibly) reality
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Melvin DavidNov 8 '14 at 11:30

What's the name of these tables? Also, Noah didn't go to Mt Sinai.
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curiousdanniiNov 8 '14 at 11:35

In the Hebrew Bible, the faithful remnant were a subset of Jews. Please click here. That is, while all Israelites were the biological descendants of Abraham, they were not all sons of the Promise by faith like Abraham. The Apostle Paul specifically mentions the faithful remnant of Israel in Romans 9:27, which started with the cadre of faithful Jews at Pentecost.

When Pentecost occurred, this entire faithful remnant of Israel at that time passed from the Old Covenant and into the New Covenant. (According to Matthew 24:6 in partial fulfillment of Ezekiel 37:12-14, some of the faithful remnant who had died actually rose from the dead in order to participate in Pentecost.) The faithful remnant, again, are those Jews whose faith was in the Promised Seed (Jesus Christ), and of course all unbelieving Jews were cut off from the New Covenant. Please click here. Shortly after Pentecost the Gentiles were added (or grafted) into the “olive tree,” which Paul discusses in Romans 11:11-24. Please click here.

At a certain point in the future, when apostasy will characterize the professing Body of Christ (1 Tim 4:1-5; 2 Tim 3:1-5; and 1 Thess 2:3), the Gentiles will be broken off (Romans 11:22 and Romans 11:25). What that means is that the time of baptizing believers into the Body of Christ has come to an end. What faithful remnant among Gentiles and Jews on the earth at that time will be removed (1 Thess 4:15-17). Please click here.

Thus, from that point forward, the New Covenant will be the exclusive prerogative of Israel as was promised in the Hebrew Bible. But there is a problem. There are no believers on the earth, since what faithful remnant remained was taken away (or raptured). Thus the Lord will call 144,000 Jews (who are biological descendants of Abraham) to be his faithful remnant on earth, and they will be the ones through whose ministry peoples of the earth will be able to participate in the New Covenant, which will vie with the pseudo New Covenant, operating by the pseudo Antichrist. Please click here. The 144,000 will be witnesses of the true New Covenant to the world, but believers will not be conjoined into mystical union with the Body of Christ until later (discussed below).

Please note that these 144,000 are sealed so that they will not be killed by the divine judgments to occur on earth (see Rev 7:3 and compare with Rev 7:16 for those believers who are not sealed). In Rev 14:1 the mark of the 144,000 is in contradistinction to the mark of the Antichrist in Rev 13:18. Thus the mark (seal) of the Antichrist is his false “New Covenant” written on the heart and mind, and the mark (seal) of the 144,000 is the New Covenant of the Lamb (also written on the heart and mind per Jeremiah 31:33 when compared with Hebrews 8:10)... So the gospel message of the 144,000 will be no different than it is today. The only difference will be that believers will become part of the faithful remnant of Israel and not members in mystical union with the Body of Christ until the marriage [supper] of the Lamb.

The passages in the Christian New Testament that alluded to the destruction of Jerusalem (Matt 24 and Luke 21) will now find complete fulfillment for these believers (living in Israel) in the future. That is, they will be saved if they persevere (and they must reject the false “New Covenant” of the pseudo- or anti-Christ of the future). In addition, at this time the Antichrist will consummate the abomination of desecration of the future temple, which the Apostle Paul allude in 2 Thess 2:4. Please click here to see the "timeline." This desecration will silence heaven for one-half hour, and mark the time of the Great Tribulation. Please click here.

Thus the unfulfilled predictive prophecies in the post-exilic prophets (such as Joel, Zechariah, et al.) will come into focus because now we are talking about “Israel” and the faithful remnant again, which will be purged in the Day of the Lord that starts (in "darkness") and will end with the glorious appearing of the Lord (in "light"). This is the same Day of the Lord (starts at night and ends in light), which Peter had expected at Pentecost, but which did not occur on the entire earth because of the intervention of the mystery. Please click here to review that narrative and background.

After the Second Advent, the faithful remnant will be saved (which will comprise every tongue, tribe, and nation according to Rev 7:9); these believers (along with the entire pre-Pentecost faithful remnant) will become members of the Body of Christ at the marriage supper of the Lamb, when all faithful from all ages will become “one flesh” (or married) into mystical union with the Body of Christ.

Thus the 144,000 are actual biological descendants of Abraham, who will witness to Jews and Gentiles in the end times concerning the true New Covenant.